Scratch
by gulveg
Summary: They'll keep each other's secrets, but their promise will be sealed in blood: the scratch on her neck; the scratches down his back. Abigail/Hannibal
1. Chapter 1

Walls had been no obstacle.

The night had been cold and still, with streetlights cutting like razor lines scratched into glass. She had reached his office before she knew it, hiding in the dark on the mezzanine, in the comforting scent of wood and books and leather. She thought she might watch him, safe from behind the bars of the railing like one contemplates a predator in a zoo.

She wasn't sure what she wanted from Lecter, or how she might go about getting it. But thoughts and memories (of hunting knives and hands at her neck) clashed and scratched at the inside of her head and in there she found no solace. Despite what Abigail knew Lecter had done to her and what he was trying to do to her, he was still and calm in a shifting and cutting world. He was where she sought shelter.

Dr. Lecter had known she was there before she had decided what to actually do or say. He greeted her warmly, with his low clipped tones. His voice—the voice on the phone—was nothing if not soothing, crisp and authoritative. You were obeying it before you even knew it.

"Come down from there" he said, looking up, allowing his lips to curve up slightly. She regarded him, wary, aware she looked every inch the starved animal he was offering food to that she was.

She looked down at him. He was unlike anyone she had ever encountered—foreign, strong and fine-boned, sophisticated. He intimidated her, to say the least. There was something magnetic about him. Some dark immensity to him that commanded its own gravity.

Abigail came down.

As she stepped from the ladder. he proffered his hand, a consummate gentleman. His hand was still and steady, and very strong. He sported the amused quirk to his face that he seemed to prefer when regarding her; she had noticed he otherwise kept pleasantly impassive (except when regarding Special Agent Graham).

Abigail was too overwrought to exercise her normal control. She was raw, and let her voice go scratchy and raw as she confessed. As she confronted him his eyes seemed to glitter; she admired his ability to hide so much of his thought process. He was smooth and coiffed and lupine, and gave her very little back to work with.

She hadn't wanted him to apologize. She had just wanted him to—to react. Because he had saved her. Maybe she hadn't needed saving to begin with. On more than one level, he was responsible for the danger that she was in now. She just knew he was the only one who could calm her head.

He took her accusations seriously, smoothing them over without dismissing them. He had a way of talking, a velvet commanding coolness to his immaculately chosen words where it seemed he was shaping reality by speaking. He could make things seem logical, clever, that maybe were insane or horrifying. But in her state, she couldn't tell. She only knew his words were comforting; a palliative, even as she felt their poison seeping in the broken parts of her mind and heart.

"I'll keep your secret," he assured her.

"And I'll keep yours," she had said, plainly, looking into his dark eyes. It could have been her imagination, but there seemed to be rich little pools of red in them. Up close and alone, she could sense there was something simmering beneath his marble surface; his exotic bone structure and his heavy lips, with the wide and shallow cupid's bow. It was hard not to watch his lips move as he spoke. It was hard not to reach out for him—she felt very lost, and he was the only thing she could think of to hold on to, even as he frightened her.

He gave her a knowing, almost affectionate smile, tilting his head. "No more climbing walls, Abigail," he said. He was warning her to go no further. She smiled at him.

Lecter returned to his desk; he had a loping, calculated grace to his movements. "Give me one moment;" he said, rearranging some papers and books. "And then I will return you to the hospital, or another location if you wish."

No, she thought, no. She couldn't just go back, that couldn't be their whole conversation.

But staring at his back, he couldn't think of what else to say. She felt frantic and ragged compared to him—unformed. His suit was cool, against the blood of the walls. As he stood and sorted his papers, she watched the muscles on his back pull against the fabric of the suit. All of a sudden she felt very, very alone, and desperate, and all the warmth bled out of her. She shuddered a sigh, and it caught in her throat like a sob in spite of herself.

Dr. Lecter straightened at the sound, and turned. He looked her over as she caught her breath, and cocked his head, and knitted his brow in concern.

"Are you hungry?" he said, after a pause. "You are agitated, and understandably so; perhaps I can—"

There must have been something in her face, her rapid heartbeat and wide staring eyes and frantic breaths. He tilted his head, considering.

"Abigail," he finally said. His accent made her name, round and friendly in most people's mouths, seem sharper, staccato. Dangerous. "Come here. To me." Again, the same tone as before: stating the future, making it come true. Again extending an arm. She approached him, slowly, hands at her side, head down.

He put out a hand on her shoulder; she seized the opportunity to lean forward bury her face in his fine suit, embracing him, her arms crooked up over his shoulders. He froze, but then gently rested his arms around her.

She gently rubbed her face against his chest—he smelled amazing—and pressed her hips into his. She felt him rest his head against hers, inhaling her hair.

At that, Abigail knew she had either condemned or saved herself.

He led her back to a bright blue satin couch pushed flush against a wall, sitting her down. He didn't say anything; just held her, stroking her long dark hair. Abigail was conscious of the strange feeling—becoming more and more familiar—of being able to enjoy a lush moment while still plotting, still gauging and testing the other person.

She pushed a hand over his chest and shoulder to loop around his neck. There was a lean hardness and strength to him, a warmth to his skin she found intoxicating and terrifying. She almost felt awe; he didn't seem completely human.

"I can't—" she finally said. "What am I? What's inside me?"

"We cannot choose our natures, Abigail," Lecter murmured. She felt as well as heard his voice, the low tones resonating in her body, strangely delicious. "But we can refine them."

"You'll help me?"

"As always, if you ask me to."

(He always wanted her to think it was her fault, her choice.)

(And it was, wasn't it?)

"You can help me…be like you?"

"What do you mean?"

She bit her lip. "To… know what to do? What to say?"

She felt him shift, leaning his cheek against her head. "Of course. You are a profoundly bright young woman. We will start from scratch; it will not take long, I think."

She leaned back, looking up, her wide blue eyes steady. "But what if—what if I'm just messed up? Just damaged, just like totally damaged forever. All marked up." She raised her hand to her scarf covering her neck wound. (That was not plotting, she realized, as the words tumbled out. It was fear.)

He was wearing his calm smile again. He raised a rawbone hand—"May I?" he said.

She nodded. He gently untied the scarf, folding it and placing it back in her hand, as he looked at her healing scar. It was red, and raw-looking and angry, she knew. It didn't hurt much.

(Hunting had taught Abigail Hobbs many things. She knew that when a creature was wounded, it could attract protectors. Mostly, visible wounds attracted predators. Dr. Hannibal Lecter had presented himself thus far as both; time would tell which one he would prove to be. Still, she felt as shy showing him her scar as she did the first time she kissed a boy.)

"It is just a scratch," he said, his lips curling into a smile that touched his eyes, that showed teeth. "It will heal."

"No it won't," she said, "not really," She wasn't pretending at despair. The same hitch caught in her throat. "I'm ruined, I'm-"

"Shh-shh," he hushed her, and he got that same look in his eyes as when he proffered his help—of considering and then deciding upon an attractive if risky option. He leaned forward, slowly, giving her ample time to protest. She didn't, although every nerve ending was trembling in anticipation. He bent his head to her neck like a vampire, to just above the cut where her jawbone met her neck. He pressed his lips to the spot. His breath and mouth were hot on her skin, giving her goosebumps. "Does this hurt?" he said softly, murmuring in her ear.

"No," she breathed, "it's…" She trailed off. In fact it was very much the opposite. There was something almost unpleasant about his close physical presence, that was overwhelming—like hovering your hand too close to a flame. Almost.

He kissed her scar. For a moment her mind went blank at the sensation of his full lips on her skin, the sting, the softness. She knew she must have tasted metallic, like blood, like the blade that sliced her open raw. He didn't seem to mind.

She tilted her head back, raising a hand to his smoothed hair, ending up on his neck. "Mmm," she couldn't help humming, in the back of her throat.

He immediately leaned back, her hand slipping away to land on his chest. He removed it, but kept her hand in his hands, in his lap. His lightly stroked and scratched with his thumbnail where her thumb met her forefinger, drawing little lazy designs. The sensation was such that Abigail found herself hotly shifting in her seat. He looked chagrined, but he kept stroking, kept scratching, his eyes burning red. "Forgive me," he said. "A mistake. Again. This is unusual for me," he said, gently.

But something had uncoiled in her. "You said you would help me, if I asked."

"I did."

"Help me. I'm like you, aren't I?" She pulled him by his beautiful lapels, closer to her.

"I told you," he said, but his lips were twitching. "No more climbing walls."

"I'm over this one already, aren't I?" she breathed.

Abigail couldn't begin to imagine Lecter's usual type. She had thought at first he had some affinity or longing for Graham-and maybe he did-but he must at least appreciate women, from the way he touched her, from the way his eyes burned. He must like sophisticated women, she knew, women like Dr. Bloom who were educated and refined and charming and beautiful. Not girls like her, little more than a child who was too smart for her own good and profoundly damaged—jittery and frantic; raw.

She knew she had a certain prettiness—large blue eyes, full lips, dark hair. She realized that probably didn't matter to him.

She leaned forward, brazen and broken as ever. But Abigail was young, and panicked in the last few inches. He looked her over, speculatively, almost hungrily, and smiled, and kissed her mouth. It was chaste at first, soft. She was the one that opened her mouth to his; he responded then, taking control. He looped his hand round her neck, pressing her to him with a cold possessiveness that took away what breath she had. When his tongue entered her mouth, she couldn't help but moan as he briefly blacked out her capacity for thought.

He tasted like wine, and pomegranate.

All she could think of was pressing against him; feeling more of him against her, holding her and sustaining her above blackness like mounted antlers.

His other hand pressed on her ribcage, inside her jacket, just below her breast; it moved round to linger at the small of her back, under her shirt, his fingers playing lightly at the small of her back, sending flushes of excitement down. Oh, she thought, oh, as he took off her jacket. He knew what he was doing. He knew exactly what he was doing. This was not like the boys she had toyed with before, discarding them out of disappointment, from an inability to keep up with her. Lecter was changing her already just from his touch, redirecting blood, rerouting neurons, while she became malleable in his hands. Like dough. Like meat.

Her agitation had left her incredibly sensitive to stimuli. Her body started responding without her approval, rising to his touch, writhing impatiently for more. The sounds she heard herself making were obscene to her ears, but she almost couldn't bring herself to care.

While he was being more gentle than she expected, a brutality and hunger lurked in his touch. She ran her hands over his chest, his face, holding onto his shoulders. He was immensely strong and hard beneath the thin fine fabric of his wonderful suit, cool-colored against his warm skin, dark eyes, ashy hair.

She started to relax in his arms, and he leaned her back as gently as he had leaned back Dr. Bloom, after he had bashed her head against the rock wall. She opened her eyes as he looked down at her, brushing her hair out of her face even as his own perfectly brushed hair fell down. (The sight of the hair spilling into his face turned her on tremendously. She wanted to see him undone, unmade, like she felt. As both punishment and reward.)

At first she had thought him emotionless. In fact, he was just extraordinarily contained. But his eyes would narrow, his head tilt, his lip twitch—or in this case, curl. The way he was regarding her…was delight, she decided, but it was a private delight, not one to be shared with her. A delight at circumstance, of discovering an unexpected novelty.

"Now, Abigail," he said, tucking his hair back. "Now is the time to ask me to stop, if you want me to." She believed him that he would stop, if she asked him to this one time, although his hands still dug into her flesh, although his weight was still heavy and welcome on her, although his breath had quickened and she was rubbing herself up and down him.

(She wasn't sure who was manipulating who; who was really getting what they wanted out of this encounter. She hoped it was her. She doubted it was her.)

She shifted, the side of her hips and ass grinding against his lap. His eyes flickered as she ascertained that he was as aroused by the situation as she was. This was a strange comfort—although he seemed a monster, a god, inhuman—he was still a man, and could be controlled like a man. She pressed her thighs into his erection, hard even though his trousers and her pants.

"No," she said, "I am asking you not to stop."

"Good," he almost purred, "good girl," and the darkness in his tone sent all her blood rushing suddenly down. She pressed her thighs together to offer some pressure as relief; it only made things worse. She whimpered,

"Have you…?" his delicacy was almost ludicrous, but she didn't laugh.

She thought about lying, but thought better of it. "No," she answered solemnly. "But I take—for cramps, I mean. So you don't. But no. I haven't. Um."

He nodded curtly, jutting his jaw out momentarily in thought. "Very well." He sat up, carefully, impassively removing his suit jacket and folding it on the back of the couch. He removed his vest and tie, a little of the cold haughtiness returning to his face. The terse efficiency, demonstrating a very adult masculinity, appealed very much to young Abigail. He pushed up his shirtsleeves before turning back to her—she admired his forearms, strong, dusted with dark hair. Without the added structure of his jacket, she could see he was unexpectedly lean.

"Here, sit up," Lecter said. He pulled her up with the same deference that he had helped her down the ladder with. He ran her hands up her thighs to her shirt, helping her out of it. He expertly unhooked her bra—an ugly everyday thing, she had not expected the night to end like this. The air felt cold and strange on her exposed breasts, as did his eyes. She made to cover herself.

He tutted, moving like lightning to catch her arms before she could cross them, his grip almost hard enough to hurt. He looked her up and down, slightly working his jaw, his heavy mouth open. She was a pretty girl, and had seen how mens' faces could darken and transform with lust. But there was something different about this hunger—it animated his face instead of dulling it.

He looked up at her, and for the first time smiled as he leaned her back, leaning into her neck, his lean, blunt hands moving to her waist and breasts. She felt she was being fed upon; it was not unpleasant. One of his large hands cupped her breast completely, his fingers rolling and pinching her nipple, making her cry out and jerk against him. He rose, using her momentum to part her legs and nestle his bulk between them. It was all efficient, all utterly purposeful. He moved down, kissing a line down her neck to her breast, taking one in his mouth, working it—nipping slightly, making her cry out again.

Abigail ran hands her hands through his hair, mussing it. Although she knew she had utterly lost control of the situation she felt strangely powerful as she gazed down to see him sating himself on her breasts and flesh, his eyes half-closed, his patrician lips on her skin. He moved down, removing her shoes and pants as quickly as he had removed his own jacket, vest, and tie. She raised her hips to help him.

He placed both hands on her waist, digging hard into her body, before he moved his hands down. He rubbed a thumb experimentally between her thighs, over the thin, dampening fabric of her panties. She gasped, arching her back as he pulled them off. Before she could catch her breath, she lay naked and open before him.

He flicked his eyes to hers. "We must prepare you adequately," he said, simply, as if she was a piece of meat to marinade, a batter to be constituted from scratch, before he moved down between her legs. She almost cried out in protest—too much, too intense, she couldn't, she wasn't expecting—but her words turned to whimpers as he licked her, slowly at first, then not so slowly. His tongue was hot and wet, the texture maddening. He licked up her cunt to her clit, manipulating it with his tongue, sucking, even biting once or twice, softly—which hurt, but only increased her sensitivity to his ministrations and his hot breath on her.

She bucked and kicked at the intensity of sensation, building, coiling, white hot, driving out all language and thought. He held her down, more brutally and viciously with every attempt of hers to move away from his incredible mouth, until it hurt, until he also entered her with his tongue, still rubbing her clit with his fingers—and it broke, washing over her, white-hot, dam of ice-water breaking over her, washing way her agitation, her untasty thoughts, her tasty ones. He kept his mouth on her as she shuddered and clenched, only raising his head when the orgasm had subsided.

She was breathless, overwhelmed, scrabbling her hands on the blue couch. He reached out to place a warm hand on her stomach as a comfort, as he gently wiped his mouth with a handkerchief, which he placed on his suit jacket. He gave her a moment, rubbing her stomach and legs companionably, while she recovered.

She reached out again, to pull him down on her mouth, his body hard and pressing between her legs. The taste had only sharpened her hunger for him. The impassiveness, she was thrilled to see, had left his face. She felt almost special to see so much of him; she saw how he hid around his clueless colleagues. Her own monster.

(He said they would start from scratch; had they already started?)

She fumbled at his pants. She was used to jeans, not trousers, and after a moment he helped her undo them and pull him out. She was still panting, face flushed, mouth open. She was not very experienced, and an erect cock was still a novelty to her. She ran her hand up and down its length experimentally, grasping it, pulling, playing her fingers around the hot, velvety length. She was rewarded not with sounds or exclamation, but by him briefly closing his eyes tight.

He pulled her hand away, angling himself down. She started unbuttoning his shirt; she could do that—or at least, she could, until he started rubbing the head of his cock against her opening.

"Now, Abigail. Now, my girl," he said, taking her face in his hand to make her look at him. "This can be slow, or fast. Either way, this is really going to hurt."

"I know," she said. She could see the thought did not entirely displease him. She wasn't sure if it displeased her either. "Fast."

He nodded. She wrapped her arms around him, as if she were holding onto him for comfort (the child only has her parent to run to after she has been punished) and he drove into her, all at once.

She felt like she was being split; stabbed with a knife—it was sharp, and sudden, and there was a strange hot wetness that could only have been blood. She gasped and clutched at him, tears in her eyes. He only started moving when she had caught her breath, and then, slowly, as the pain mostly subsided, and there was only a sharp and pleasant fulness. But she felt the hot splurt of blood on her thighs and knew it was on the beautiful blue couch, and for some reason this made her cry out and twist under him. At first his lip curled at her struggle, and he pinned her hand pushing against him with his own, held her under him, until she cried out—"your couch."

He paused, and laughed—actually laughed—and pulled out and back, to examine the damage (her) critically. She scrabbled up, looking at the blood on her cunt and thighs. "We've ruined it," she said, stupidly.

He laughed again, softly, not unkindly. "You dear girl. We've done no such thing; I am adept at removing bloodstains," he said, reaching out to push her hair our of her face, pushing her back prone. "Allow me." Something glittered in his reddish eyes, though, and he lowered himself to her stained thighs. Between the orgasm and the pain, she was abnormally sensitive, and whimpered as he kissed and licked at her thighs, her cunt. Even through the pain, between the sensation and the sound she felt as if she might come again. She heard him suck and swallow; she saw him raise his monstrous head, with blood on his lips, surreal, between her pale legs.

"There," he said, something obscene in his satisfaction. The taste had released something in him. He mounted her once more, roughly, kissing her harshly so she tasted her own blood. She was so shocked by his unnatural quickness and the taste of blood and wine together that she registered pain before remembered what it was. He moved inside of her slowly, almost tenderly, and she buried her face in his chest and wrapped her arms and a leg around him. He kissed her face; if her cries sounded too much like pain he slowed. This wasn't tenderness, not exactly, but she could pretend she thought it was. She was grateful he was pretending, at least, this deal sealed in blood could have gone much differently.

(She thought of the way he had said "gutted" when he accused her of butchering that man, the way he had shamed and frightened her into submission, into accepting his help. The way she already depended on him, like he engineered, and owed him. And the way that sometimes the safest place was beside the monster—or under it, as it may be, as it was now—instead of in front of it, as prey.)

(But the dark part of her, the part that didn't plot but savored every wrong second—this part was not new but had been dormant; it almost frightened her with its intensity)

Abigail had been worried she had only had movies to show her how to behave, but instinct was instinct. She met his thrusts without thinking. She matched his rhythms, curling into him, as he wound his hand through her long hair, pulling gently, and not-so-gently. She buried her face in his neck and chest, clasping to him—she then took his own face between her hands, savoring her power, as he held his head, and kissed him. He smiled against her lips as he started moving faster, with less control. His lips were slack; his only sound heavy breathing turned almost to panting.

She had managed to undo his shirt, and had worked her hands up under it, feeling the hard roil of his muscles as he drove into her, the curve of his back into his narrow hips. His stubble scratched her face, the good side of her neck. He started nipping softly at her shoulder, her neck. Abigail felt predatory too—she started clawing at him, out of lust, out of anger Her fingernails sunk into his skin as she dragged them across his back, scoring him, scratching long lines across his back, his shoulder blades. She felt him bare his teeth into her skin, even as he moved a hand down back between her legs, and she melted.

She came again, clawing at his back, drawing blood as he had drawn hers. He drove into her further, all the way, and it hurt tremendously even as she wailed in delight—and then was still, gasping softly, as he came hot inside her.

She clung to him for a moment, not wanting to let him go. He allowed it for a moment, until he disentangled himself, all icy control again but smiling at her gently.

"Remarkable girl," he said, kissing her forehead. She closed her eyes, and breathed.

With a few precise movements, he had cleaned them both with his handkerchief and had done up his pants and shirt, smoothing his hair back, before turning back to her.

"Now," he said, pulling her up, helping her dress herself. "We have sealed our deal in blood. It is time for you to have something to eat.'" There was a subtle emphasis on "you," as if he had already been fed, and she wondered if he had done it on purpose, and if so, if she had been meant to catch it. He purposefully left her scarf on the couch. She grinned, shy all of a sudden, a little dizzy from sensory overload, as she let him lead her towards his desk chair. He kept a hand possessively on her shoulder as he led her.

She felt her neck as he made some cursory phone calls—yes he had found her, she was fine, he would put her to bed and return her to the hospital in the morning, she just needed a brief escape. She saw, to her profound satisfaction, the blood on his back staining his crisp and perfect shirt.

(Tonight would buy her time, she hoped, to figure out her next steps. She hoped she could continue to fuck him.)

As she watched Hannibal Lecter smoothly manipulate various hospital staff and agents via phone to ensure their privacy, as her body shuddered and twitched out the aftershocks of their encounter, as she shifted, trying to find a sitting position that didn't hurt—she thought of how he might see the world, and people.

He must see everyone as there for him to carve up and reconstitute into more pleasing shapes for him to consume, whether they were dead or alive. Make you up from scratch, he had said, and the thought wasn't entirely unwelcome—that he could impart some of that blood-black cool stillness to her fevered state. Just as if he were making a meal of her, that by an alchemy of heat and pressure (touch and words and circumstance) he could bend her to his will as easily as he bent over the corpse she made, as he bent over her on the couch.

The bloody mark on his back from her scratch (maybe even now spreading her own poison) was curved, like a linoleum knife.


	2. Raw

Abigail sat in his desk chair, holding her arms and shifting uncomfortably. Her hair was mussed and her lovely lips parted. She looked him over curiously, speculatively, as he called the hospital to calmly explain her whereabouts.

She was still flushed from pain and orgasm both. All that lovely blood that he had worked so hard to keep inside her body and not on the tile floor of her kitchen was still pumping near the surface of her skin, having risen to and obeyed his touch again.

He allowed himself to savor the sight.

Abigail met his gaze and, beautifully, flushed further, running her hands through her hair to straighten it.

Hannibal Lecter took control in his life: a hard-learned lesson turned necessary game, to form and present the world like a meal to his taste, to himself. Surprises were rare, as they were in preparing meals.

One could only do so much with the ingredients one had.

And yet Abigail Hobbs continued to surprise him. He had not planned on fucking her, for instance; he was honest when he said he wanted to help and protect her. In fact felt a profound affection for her, that he had already dissected and pinned and labeled. To reclaim his power had been a difficult experience for him; it needn't be for her. Their relationship could have easily remained chaste.

But Lecter was an opportunist above all. He could curb his hunger, but he would to indulge it when useful. This was one more way to bond her to him—if only through the effect on the brain of the hormones released during orgasm.

(This went both ways, he had been careful to note, and adjusted his calculations accordingly.)

That evening, Abigail had crawled over walls to get to him, to speak with him. The desperation in her voice broke as she was finally honest with him-honest with someone for the first time since he had met her.

She alone among his circle had already figured him out—one dark creature recognizing another. And already she was pushing him, while at the same time clinging to him. He had ended up taking her, tasting her, on the couch in his office. She had been and was pure and sharp and desperate, and too lovely in her torment and in her trembling.

At first, he mused, as he calmed the hospital administrator on the phone with his smooth low voice, he would be very careful with her. Given her own enthusiasm and predilections she had demonstrated (his back throbbed, as he shifted the phone in his hand) he probably wouldn't have to be careful for very long.

She was much, much younger than he preferred. She had little of the dark lushness about her that he liked in women. Her body was still unfinished—a little too slim, too firm. Her eyes were wide and blue and startled, her appearance unstudied, her mouth thin and tense. What she had, though, was prettiness-and brilliance, and vulnerability. She was so bright and so lovely and so broken. A wounded animal who was only just realizing she had claws.

Her pain and bewilderment and anger shone even now as she sat before him; he could smell it, taste it in the air, bitter and bright. There was such power in her, all turned in to attack herself and lash out at others indiscriminately.

Delicious.

One could only do so much with what one had, but with the right ingredients one could do so much.

He hung up, delicately pacing the phone back in the receiver. He kneeled, putting himself at eye level with her as he placed a broad hand companionably on her knee.

"I am going to call Dr. Bloom now," he said. "I will make arrangements for you to either stay at the office here, or at my home, for the night. Or I can return you to the hospital, but I would not recommend that option. You do not appear as if you have been occupied with anything wholesome."

She grinned. "I look like I've been…fucking, you mean." She peered at him closely, trying to gauge his reaction. He gave her none.

(Her shyness matched with her brazenness was rather charming. She made no secret of when she was testing you. Hannibal supposed Abigail was very able to manipulate those in her life previously; combined with her youth that fact explained her lack of subtlety.)

"Yes," he said simply.

"I can go home with you?"

"You'll sleep in your own bed, of course." He didn't want her to think that his interest in her was purely sexual; it would be counterproductive as well as untrue.

"After tonight."

He licked his lips. It would not be unpleasant to have her curled around him, clinging to him, defenseless, dependent. Just once. For now. "We'll see."

He patted her knee and rose to call Alana Bloom. With Alana, he kept his tone warm, minimizing the authoritarian overtones he had used with the nurse, managing to sound gently put upon by her runaway patient while still being happy to help.

(His dear Alana was hardest to manipulate among his circle at the FBI. She respected him but was not intimidated by him. She did, however, lust after him, and would be soothed by perceived power over him—he would probably start pursuing her romantically soon. He liked her bright mind and kind heart, as well as her penchant for intense sensation and little broken things like Will and Abigail.)

Abigail had begun to shiver. Still talking Alana down, he retrieved his jacket from the couch (the spilled blood was already drying dark on the brilliant blue) to wrap it around Abigail's small shoulders. The movement unstuck his shirt from where it was scabbing onto his skin.

Abigail smiled wanly at him as he settled his jacket on her. He leaned over to press his full lips to her forehead before informing Alana that he would have Abigail returned to the hospital first thing in the morning, good as new.

To keep himself free of further distraction, he suggested Alana call and appraise Will of the situation. This would occupy both of them with their unresolved and mutual attraction.

Abigail was more like Will than Alanna. She, like Will, lacked the polish and precision that education and privilege brought. They were both enormously powerful, but their unskilled, untapped power was turning in on them and hurting them. Pain lodged in their heads like hunting knives, drawing blood, leaving raw red wounds and scars.

Hannibal had once been this way. He remembered how much it hurt. He would always remember how much it hurt, how it felt to have others prey on him, eat him away without permission, to be forced to swallow too much of the world too soon. But you could control what you consumed. And Hannibal was an expert at control. There was no other way to live. He would show them both how to remove the knives from their hearts to carve their own paths. It would hurt-but everything hurt. And most things hurt deliciously.

He hung up the phone, the soft click and Abigail's breathing the only sounds in the still room. He turned to the young woman with a smile. "Shall we go?"

Abigail half-grinned. "You were really good about managing not having to take me back to the hospital."

"Not at all. Especially after all the trouble you took to get out in the first place. It is the best thing for you."

Abigail just smiled.

She was rather touchingly excited to ride home with him in his fine car. She admired it shyly, running her hands on the exterior, the leather. On the drive he kept conversation light and casual, asking her about her interests. She said she liked music-he played for her some of his and explained the rudiments of what to listen for.

She only displayed discomfort before entering the house, slowing and stopping before the doorway. Hannibal could both smell and see her (admittedly, reasonable) trepidation. He opened the door and waited.

"Abigail," he said, extending a hand. "I promise you that you are in complete control of whatever happens to you in this house—except in regards to one thing."

"What's that?"

"I am making you, at the very least, a late night snack. A diet of only hospital food is not healthy for young women." He smiled, openly. She blushed, an involuntary reaction, and averted her eyes, smiling.

But then she laughed, and walked in. "I like seeing you smile, Dr. Lecter," she said, shyly. "Like, really smile. You never do around the rest of them, not really."

"Yes, I do," he said, closing the door behind them. "Here," he said, gesturing. "The kitchen is this way."

"No, you don't. Not really. You're very...um. Closed. Very controlled."

"It is understandable you would think that. You have only seen me in very serious circumstances."

"Oh, I know. What I'm saying is, maybe—I can keep secrets too? You can smile around me. Let go a little bit. I mean if I can, you can too. I guess. You know."

He rewarded her with another open smile. She was already trying to lower his defenses, even as she spoke the truth. At the same time, her face and voice were honest—she was reaching out to him, as he wanted—and asking him to reach back out to her, as she wanted.

"Just right straight ahead, yes," he said, letting her lead. "And of course you may call me by my name, Hannibal. When we are alone. Do you think you can manage that?"

"Of course I can."

"If you cannot, I'm afraid the repercussions will be severe."

"Or they'll just think I'm being like disrespectful or over-familiar, but yeah, I understand. Or do you mean severe because of you. Wow. Your house is beautiful." It was not politeness, but genuine admiration.

"Thank you. It is a pleasure to have you as a guest." He turned on the lowlights in the kitchen; all was glossy surface and warm yellow light, centered at the counters to enahnce a feeling of smallness and intimacy. He took his usual place at the counter, setting out the pans and the knives and the cutting board. With a small flush of pleasure he removed the meat—liver, a very specific liver—from the fridge.

She came to his side, slowly, attempting nonchalance. "Can I watch?" Abigail asked.

He looked at her sternly, pursing his lips, before picking her up by the waist and plunking her down on the counter next to the preparation space. She giggled, before stopping and going solemn. She obviously didn't want him to see her as too young. The top of the counter was at his waist level—she was taller sitting on it.

"What are you going to make?" she said, swinging her feet before thinking better of it. "Liver, with olives, over polenta. Simple, but strong and filling for you." He rolled up his sleeves, eschewing the apron (his clothes were already ruined.) Turning to the cabinets, he grabbed two glasses and poured them both a small amount of red wine. She almost was able to hide her hesitation as she accepted.

She watched for a moment in silence, as he chopped and prepared. He thought he would let her make the first move—she was unskilled, and it would be blunt.

"So what can you help me with, though?"

There it was.

She continued. "Can you really help me so I can sleep? So I'm not half-crazy all the time? What are you going to do?"

"But of course, I can help you," he said. "I can help you with the dreams. I can teach you control. I can teach you discipline—"

"_Discipline_," she blurted, instantly and obviously regretting it. His lips twitched.

"Of many kinds," he amended. "And I can teach you to take joy where you can, and when."

"Why would you do this? Like, what do you get out of this? I'll keep your secret anyways."

"That will have to be another one of your considerations." He stopped, and looked up at her. Her lips were pursed into a pout; she was beginning to look troubled again. "Here is my advice. Do not worry about this tonight. Eat, and then sleep. Recover."

She scowled. "I appreciate—I mean, thanks. But. You don't have to be so careful with me. Everyone is so careful with me. They're either afraid of me or they don't know what else to do with me."

"If you are referring to Special Agent Graham or Dr. Bloom, they are careful because they care about you."

"Yeah?"

"As do I," he said.

"Why?" she said. "Because you saved me?"

"Because I understand your plight," he said. "And you deserve to be helped."

Abigail said nothing for some moments, dropping her gaze to his hands as he prepared the food. She had a familiar way of letting her face go cold while she examined something. She watched him chop the liver on the cutting board, the swift tense stokes of his arms and hands with the long knife. He could see her shifting; tensing. Even under the blood of the liver he could smell the shift in tone in her skin. She reached out for his hand, tentative. He stopped his movements.

She took his hand with the knife; he let her. Her touch was cool as she gripped too tight. He could see her beating pulse in her pale neck. He swallowed.

"You know, I'm not actually very hungry," she said. "Although I'm sure you're an amazing cook."

"I have some skill. But that is quite all right. Our first meal together will be later."

She took the knife from his hand, still holding his hand in her left as she held up the knife. It was bloody from the liver. Not looking at him, her tongue darted out to lick some off. The taste seemed to set something off in her, and she grinned up at him.

"Abigail—" "Are you going to try to salvage that shirt?"

"No. I'm afraid it's quite ruined."

Abigail, holding his gaze, began to cut through his shirt buttons. She started at his throat, actually pressing the cool wet blade momentarily to his skin before pulling it away and down. He felt the blade work, snicking the buttons off his shirt one by one. She ran her cool little fingers up his chest when she was done, curiosity and lust touchingly open on her face. "Abigail," he said again, putting a bloody hand up to her cheek, leaning in to smell her, then to press his forehead against hers. "You shouldn't."

She responded by taking his bloody thumb in her teeth. She stared, blue-eyed and wanton, tonguing and sucking.

Hannibal could actually feel his eyes glitter red; his lip curl.

He felt an unexpected stab of hunger, for her sweetness (a different taste then Will—similar in some ways, but with a cold chill overtone that he lacked, a different sort of bitter honey taste). Her brittle little mind bright with pain, her pale tense body, so soft, so hot and tight. The way she had clenched around and clung to him.

If she was indeed anything like him—and she was, a little goddess in the raw, already manipulating and creating her own world around her and making others bow to it—it would not be good to have her be too comfortable with him yet.

He pushed what there was of the food preparations away, and let her pull him between her legs by his ruined shirt.

He pulled his hand from her mouth, tracing her lips with his thumb, before wrapping his hand around her neck, through her hair, pulling her head back even as he tilted his own back to contemplate her. She was his; if she didn't know now she would soon.

He pulled her to him to kiss her, roughly, her hum of surprise muffled by his lips and tongue. She responded, to his surprise and delight, by pulling him forward, pulling their hips together so she could press against him. One hand held onto his arm for support, one rested on his chest.

He pulled off her top layers more quickly this time but no less efficiently. He could smell her arousal, deep low red tones, urgent in the cool kitchen air already heavy with spice. He could also smell the brittle electric white of fear, but also delight at the fear. He dug his fingers deeper into her flesh; she should not be too comfortable with him yet.

(Flickering through his mind, unbidden imges—her tied with silk to the bedposts, coming over and over again until she was exhausted, weeping. Learning from him how to seduce others. Writhing underneath him on white sheets.)

He started pulling away; she protested. "Some advice: to seize power, over others, over yourself, you must have control;" he whispered in her ear as she pressed herself against him insistently. "You must learn to take control. You have to at least be able to feign wanting something less than the other."

"I can learn that later," she said, almost petulant, and kissed him artlessly, hungrily. Her hand reached down to his hardening cock. "You're not so good at feigning right now," she teased. Again, challenging him—and neither one was used to being challenged.

He smiled (snarled), showing his white, uneven teeth.

With a strange quick mix of iciness and tenderness, he pulled off her shoes and pants and panties, pushing her back prone against the cold counter, her nipples on her small breasts peaking.

He took her in. Lips parted, throat exposed, exposing the raw flesh of her scar. Legs open, the rawness and bruising between them already apparent. And of course her tender, bleeding little heart.

All his.

(He was amused at Will's incessant protestations of responsibility for the girl—she belonged to Hannibal as much as Will belonged to Hannibal.)

With the same brutal efficiency, he pulled her hips closer. Her hands scrabbled to gain purchase on the slick counter to sit herself up. He pushed her back, looking down at her with hooded eyes and maddening smile, ascertaining she was already wet, although she cringed when his fingers entered her—she was still somewhat sore.

She was shifting her hips, all but begging him before he undid his trousers and angled her thighs—muscled, pale, so soft—to enter, quickly, almost all at once. Now was not the time for gentleness. She had specifically ruled out gentleness (although later, of course, he would indulge himself in coddling her.)

She cried out, gritting her teeth, as he began, and then settled into whimpers and gasps.

He was excellent at reading people—to tell the source of tears, to distinguish between cries from pain enjoyed and not enjoyed. She was enjoying herself. Besides—while it wasn't a smile, exactly, if she wanted to see him without his usual control, than he would indulge her.

And so he let go by degrees.

He let her see his snarl, his bright black eyes gone red. He would cede her his control to make her feel like she had taken it, even as he claimed her.

Hannibal towered over her prone on the counter like a monster, like a beast, his muscles pulling and rolling as he fucked her. His hips snapped to meet hers and whenever he did she gasped or keened—trying to clutch at him, to claw at him, but he kept her pushed down and at a distance as he ravaged flesh and bone. She arched her back off the counter, gasping, her mouth open, her eyes closed, her hands wrapped around his wrists.

Lecter had meant to finish like this, but she was too raw and open and lovely to remain untasted. He leaned down to kiss her throat, snarling into her skin, nipping at her neck and ear. He soon pulled her up to meet him, losing his hands in her long hair and over the swells of hip and breast. He arched her slim spine against him, her breasts against his bare chest.

(His split-open little princess, butterflied beneath him, cracked apart and ready to make again—his.)

At that thought he could not help but half-moan, once, his breath growing ragged.

He enjoyed the sensation—rare, rarified—of being swept along by forces stronger than even his brilliant mind. Sensualist as he was, beyond the brute pleasure of impending orgasm he enjoyed the obliteration it brought, of identity and thought, in crashing red waves even as it sharpened his hunger into knives.

She buried her face in his neck as she clawed into his back again with her sharp little nails, as she cringes and cries into his ear, matching his quickening rhythm, pulling at his hair. He felt her teeth at his neck, as she pled senseless pleas, not even sure what she was asking for, the urgency of her begging and grasping maddening.

At the hoarse rawness of her last "Please," he grabbed her face with both hands to bite at her lips, taste her tongue, in a last crushing kiss that muffled her moans as he came.

When he pulled back she was trembling, gasping. His lip quirked, and he rested his chin against her head as he pulled her closer, shushing her, kissing her head lightly even as he caught his breath.

He felt the exact moment when she disengaged and came back into her own; she composed herself quickly. She pulled back and smiled shyly.

"You are certain you are not hungry?" he said, smiling openly, tilting his head to meet her eyes.

"No," she said, her voice still crackly. She laughed.

(Pity. He was looking forward to feeding her a proper meal.)

"I'm…I'm pretty tired, though," she admitted, shaking her head. She looked up, not even trying to hide her scheming glint. "Can I sleep in your bed? Just like sleep."

"My dear." He kissed her lightly, on the corner of her mouth. "Of course. But just this once. After tonight, you have to sleep in your own bed."

All tenderness and courtesy now, he bundled her into a hot bath, then pajamas, then his large, lush bed. He gave her her choice of sleep aid (orgasm: oral; she was strangely fascinated by his lips) before bringing up that this would be the last time for at least a very long while that they would share this type of intimacy, and that they would especially have to be circumspect around—

"_Obviously_," she interrupted him, archly, before her blue eyes went wide and startled and she apologized. "I'm sorry. But I know. I mean, I understand." She nestled into him, deferentially.

"Of course you do," he said.

"Thanks for looking out for me," she said, not personally sure if she was sarcastic or not.

But despite her words, she snuggled up against him happily, unconsciously, wrapping his strong arm around her more snugly. He could feel her relax profoundly at his touch. She was soft and warm and pliant; she smelled of the soap and hair products of his choosing, wearing his clothes.

Since she couldn't see him, he smiled into her hair, one of snarled lip and exposed teeth. Remarkable girl. Until she had discovered and reclaimed her power, he would protect her. The only person whose mercy she would be at would be his.

Exhausted on every level, Abigail fell asleep almost immediately. After some minutes, Hannibal shifted when he was certain he wouldn't wake her. He was rewarded with a starburst of pain, electric white, on his upper back. She had reopened the scratch, and more. His left shoulder blade in particular was scraped raw.

As she curled into him, and smiled, and sighed, and his shoulder throbbed, Hannibal felt an unexpected stab between his ribs.

(That phrase came into his head, also unbidden—"At what moment does the knife wound sink so deep that the flesh begins to weep with love?")

Cooking was a simple matter when it came to meat. For living things, other pressures than heat had to be applied to form and transform. Pain was one. A sort of love was another.

Hannibal Lecter did not know how to love. Not as others did.

He only knew how to eat more slowly. To eat more carefully, only sucking out the marrow of the bones that couldn't be seen. To break and reshape and refine and cultivate.

To eat a heart raw and leave it beating, so he could devour it over and over and over. Hannibal would do it as much for her (and later Will, and even later, and lastly, Clarice) as for him.

And this was all he knew of love.


End file.
